Another deer

Posted on May 26, 2023 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Clematis, Deer, Dorothy Clive garden, Life, Photo, Sculpture, Stag, willow withiesLeave a comment

Just down the hill from the metal stag in the Dorothy Clive garden was another stag we found. It was made of willow withies I think.

There were plants growing up through it which looked like clematis. I guess it will look amazing when the flowers are in full bloom.

I have gone a bit botanical in these last few posts. I have enjoyed getting out. I don’t go to many places anymore, and with my new camera on my phone I have taken an excessive lot of photos.

You may notice there is a brown area towards the top right of the photo? That’s because I’m waiting for a phone case and the one I’m using is too big, so the edge of the cover is overlapping the camera lens.

Somewhere to sit

Posted on May 26, 2023 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Bench, Dorothy Clive garden, Garden, Life, Plants, quarry, Rhododendrons, WaterfallLeave a comment

Deep green foliage, a gravel pathway and a bench. A calm place to rest and relax. Light streams through gaps in the planting. Bees hum and buzz. I wish I could go every day. Plants spread and cover the ground. The rhododendrons are in flower. This is the quarry at the Dorothy Clive garden in Staffordshire.

Textured sunset

Posted on May 26, 2023 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Art, Digital manipulation, Life, Photodirector, Photograph, Style, Subtle colours, Sunset2 Comments

I put a sunset photo through the photodirector app (styles) and liked this result. The effect seems to be like oil on water, fluid but blocky. The colours are subtly concentrated in patches and the line edges are more curved.

There are about seven options for textures so I went through them all to choose the one I liked best. Some of them are more smudged than others.

Mom’s wedding ring

Posted on May 25, 2023 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Art, bequest, dailyprompt, dailyprompt-1947, Jewellery, Life, Memories, Mom, precious, Support, Time, wedding ring2 Comments

What personal belongings do you hold most dear?

My wedding ring holds mom’s in place. Her hands must have been bigger than mine, hers would fall off without it. My ring is cheap, soft gold. I bought it myself for £27 from a jewellery store when we were getting married. Mom’s wedding ring is heavier and I’m sure higher quality. It’s slowly wearing mine away as they have rubbed against each other for about ten years. It was her bequest to me when she died, and every time I look at it I am reminded of the strong supportive woman she was. She allowed me to go to college when she could have insisted that I found a job. She helped me with my spelling when I was younger (I was in a low stream at school because I couldn’t see properly). They tested my eyes and I got glasses, mom helped me catch up by helping me with spelling. 100 words at a time! I got put up into the top stream at school. Mom encouraged my artistic endeavours. She would even show people my drawings.

She raised me and my siblings after our father died and went out and did two jobs to support us. She learnt to drive so she could transport us to places. She even took us out to Chinese meals and taught us how to use chopsticks. So many good and odd memories! She raised us to be polite and thoughtful. I am forever in her debt.

Abstract doodle

Posted on May 25, 2023May 25, 2023 Posted in Sketching, UncategorizedTagged 1970's, Art, Blue, Brown, Colours, Digital drawing, Doodling, Life, Poem, Poetry, Sketching, SpiralLeave a comment

You’ve got to play

Create curves

Enjoy colour

Contrast warm

and cool

A mixture of spirals

Doodled tones

1970’s vibes

Fun!

English doodle

Posted on May 25, 2023May 25, 2023 Posted in Sketching, UncategorizedTagged #bandofsketchers, Abbots Bromley, Drawing, England, horn dance, Life, molly dancers, Morris dancers, Sketching2 Comments

Today’s #bandofsketchers prompt was English. I think I went full “merry England” here! It’s definitely not fine art, more of a doodle, with morris dancers (you could have ‘molly’ dancers)… and a hobby horse, and children in the background dancing round the maypole, it’s set in a village with thatched cottages. I guess the main place I can think of that does something like this is Abbots Bromley near Rugeley in Staffordshire. They have the Abbots Bromley Horn Dance. But that’s in September? Sadly I’ve never witnessed it!

Back yard

Posted on May 24, 2023May 24, 2023 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Back yard, burgeoning, Garden, Gardening, Growing, Life, Outside, Plants, Poem, Poetry2 Comments

It’s growing,

a bit of water

It’s gone mad!

Pots overflow

Burgeoning leaves

With green waterfalls

Bubbling out of the soil

Brown turned green

Ferns in the wall..

Yellow Welsh poppies

And dark mauve geraniums

Fun to see it grow

But no room to walk

A path is required

But raspberries

And blueberries

Have flowers

Now I need bees!

Reflection

Posted on May 24, 2023 Posted in UncategorizedTagged #bandofsketchers, Drawing, Felt pens, Life, Reflection, Rode Hall lake, Sketching, subtle2 Comments

Tuesdays #bandofsketchers prompt was reflection… Quick reflection sketch. From a photo at Rode Hall lake a couple of weeks ago. The wind was ruffling the water so the reflections are a bit subtle….felt pens again.

2000 emails

Posted on May 23, 2023 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Deleting, Emails, first world problems, Irritating, Life, Mobile, pc, removing, Tenacious, Time, WorldLeave a comment

I finally got my email to work, not on my phone, but on my PC. Help! I found around 3800 emails..

I have deleted about 2000 of them. Mainly notifications from WordPress about all the wonderful blogs here! I think there are about 30 to 40 emails I need to action. Mainly to apologise for not getting back in touch.

A few times I caught the wrong bit of the line of the email (missing the delete box) that clears the ones due to be deleted. At one stage I’d got up to 200 pending deletions! I gave up then, my arm was too painful and shaking to be able to concentrate. Will do more tomorrow… First world problems… I will try and continue to be tenacious.

Found card

Posted on May 23, 2023 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Bodmin, engines, Friend, Letter, Life, Padstow, Photos, Postcard, Train, Wadebridge2 Comments

I found this in a pile of old letters a few days ago. We knew exactly who to send it to, a very old friend who comes from the south west. It’s about the Bodmin, Wadebridge and Padstow railway.

The railway line was very curved, the corners were tight, so very few engines could travel along it. It was closed to passengers in the 1930s. It was one of the earliest railways and only very short wheelbased engines could used it. It was mainly used for transportation of China clay across Bodmin moor in Cornwall to Plymouth. The track bed was laid with a camber so the engines could get round the curves. The engines were 240 Beattie Well tanks. They were usde to lower the centre of gravity (Information courtesy of my hubby).

Mallaband-Brown

Tag: Life